Phrase Challenge
by Cyranothe2nd
Summary: A kiss and the aftermath. In answer to the Phrase Challenge of WIKTT. Part three of three is now up! Please R and R. Thanks
1. By Neither Word

In answer to Deianaera's Phrase Challenge on WIKTT, I give you The Phrase Challenge. Unoriginal name, good story (I hope). This is the first of three parts.

The usual disclaimers apply. Please R/R. And yes, I am working on both Choices and Palace of Memory (shameless plugs). SHEESH!

Phrase Challenge

Chapter One: By Neither Word

It was the night after Voldemort's defeat and Number 12 Grimmauld Place was alive with festivity. Aurors were coming and going, buzzing like excited bees around Potter and Dumbledore. Amelia Bones, the new Minister of Magic, was cordially shaking the hands of each of the Weasley boys in turn, not even minding when Fred or George (I could not tell which) transfigured her red hat into a rooster. Longbottom had indulged in one too many butterbeers and come up to me, red-faced, to say, "Prof-Professor Snape, you we-weren't very nice to me in class but don't worry. I forgive you. You're a hero!" And then, horribly, Longbottom had thrown his arms around me and begun to sob. I extricated myself from the boy and thrust him in the direction of Parvati Patil, making a quick beeline for the kitchen door. I wanted nothing more than to be gone from this place but Dumbledore had ordered my presence- "You must get out more Severus" -and so here I was, being manhandled by the dunderheads that I despised and who usually despised me.

I wrenched open the heavy oak door and stepped into the relative peace of the kitchen. Relative because Molly Weasley was inside ordering the house-elves about and generally making a nuisance of herself.

"Molly dear, please come out and join the party."

"Arthur, you know very well these cakes won't make themselves!"

"But Molly, surely the house-elves…"

"No!" Molly shouted in her husband's face. "No! I _have_ to do something useful Arthur. I _have_ to-"

She began to cry. I remembered that not all her children had made it through the Battle alive. Percy Weasley had ridden into battle on Lucius' right hand and now lay dead in the cold ground. I made my way quietly across the kitchen to the back door, giving the couple a moment of privacy. I stood on the back stoop, gazing across the overgrown lawn. It was close to full moon. I would have to spend tomorrow night preparing the Wolfsbane potion for Lupin or he'd spend the night baying at the moon.

_Would serve him right_. I thought nastily, but I knew it was unfair. Lupin had rallied the werewolves to Dumbledore's standard and they had performed beautifully against the Dementors at the final battle. It was a little known fact that werewolves were not affected by Dementors the way normal witches and wizards were. Lupin had tried to explain it to me once, something about wolves only living in today and having no real memories of yesterday the way humans did. It sounded like a lot of rot to me and I thought it more likely that the Dementors simply couldn't sense the difference between werewolves and non-magical animals.

I pushed away thoughts of wolfish jaws rending putrid flesh and reached into my robes, taking out a small box. I opened it and pulled a cigarette out. With a -snap- I shut the box again and stared at it, the familiar weight of the silver cigarette case in my hand suddenly alien and sickening. I drew back my arm and threw it with all my might. The box arched into the air and with a whispered word a red light shot from the end of my wand and exploded the case into a million shining silver sparks.

My hands trembled as I lit the cigarette, breathing the smoke deeply into my lungs.

"Good throw," a voice said beside me.

I whirled. It took me a moment to make out the figure of Hermione Granger in the moonlight.

"A memento from your Deatheater days?" she asked.

I didn't know why I answered, but I did. "Lucius gave it to me when I took the Dark Mark."

"How very…refined." I caught the irony in her voice, for Lucius had been anything _but_ refined in the battle. He had struck Granger from behind and would have killed her if I had not prevented it. I could see her shiver in the semi-darkness and knew she too was remembering exactly how brutally I had dealt with Lucius Malfoy.

"I never thanked you for saving my life." Hermione's voice was light, almost breathless. She took a step closer to me. I could see her clearly now, the moonlight painted her pale face and the skin above her collarbone a soft silver-white. Her wild brown hair glinted like sparks on tinder and she was standing close enough that I could smell her, smoky vanilla and the dusty scent of old books. It was intoxicating.

Hermione took another step towards me and reached out her hand, placing it over me heart. I felt myself jerk at her touch, as though her flesh could burn through robes and shirt and skin, as though she could sear my very soul. She followed the movement, keeping contact. She looked up into my eyes and I wondered that I had ever found her to be common.

"Thank you Professor," she breathed. Then I bent my head and kissed her.

I caught her surprised gasp in my mouth and feathered my lips over hers, enthralled by her warmth and the pliancy of her lips. I felt the moment she surrendered into the kiss, opening her lips for my tongue to sweep in. I explored every inch of her mouth, reveling in the way her hands clutched at my robes, her body pushing up into mine as she deepened the kiss.

A sound of breaking glass from the house wrenched us apart, gasping and staring at each other. Hermione's face was flushed and she looked shocked. The sound of the backdoor opening brought her head snapping around.

"'Mione, you out here?"

"Coming Ron." She slipped past me without looking at me and fled towards the door. I stood for a long time in the darkness, surrounded by overgrown grass, pulling the smoke from the cigarette into my lungs. But, I couldn't quite make the taste of vanilla leave my mouth.


	2. Nor Look

Chapter Two: Nor Look

I left my chambers in the dungeons and ghosted silently through the dark halls of Hogwarts towards the Astronomy tower. It was nearly six months since the Battle of Hogwarts but the spy in me still urged me to caution. I doubted I would ever be free of the need for constant vigilance. Nor would I ever been free of the nightmares that haunted my dreams. They were always waiting, just on the edge of my waking mind, Bellatrix and McNair, Crabbe and Goyle, and Lucius…Lucius most of all. I had not been able to get a night of untroubled sleep for months but it was no more than I deserved after everything I had done. So, I spent my nights pacing the castle until I was so exhausted that I stumbled into bed and slept for the few hours between dawn and my first class.

Daybreak was shading the sky into purple and dusky rose as I made my way out to the top of the highest tower at Hogwarts. I pushed my back into the cold stones and looked out over the crenellated bricks to the eastern sky. I had come to love this time of day more than any other. I took a cigarette from the inner pocket of my robe and lit it, drawing in a deep breath of smoke and exhaling slowly. The morning sun came up over the horizon and I closed my eyes and relaxed into it, allowing my tense body to uncoil, the harsh lines of my face to become slack and peaceful. The air was still crisp, even at the end of May. Today the term would end and the students would be going home. In just a few hours I would be rid of _her_.

That was how I referred to Granger in my head now. Not by the sardonic last name that I used to twist into an insult whenever I spoke to her, and never by her first name. No, I could not bring myself to think that. So it was just _her_.

I had ignored her for the past six months. It was not hard to do. I rarely saw her outside of my NEWT level class. She had ceased waving her hand in the air or calling attention to herself in any way. She spoke when spoken to, and then without looking at me. This suited me just fine.

It had been a mistake to kiss her. She was still a student. She was twenty years my junior and a know-it-all Mudblood to boot. It had only been my relief at being alive, coupled with the moonlight and the fact that she had touched me that had prompted me to take her into my arms and press my lips to hers. But, it had been a foolish mistake.

I repeated that to myself over and over. It did not help. She had invaded my waking thoughts and when I finally slept I woke hard and aching for her. It was ridiculous. She was an eighteen-year-old girl, and I…well; I had no illusions of my own desirability. I was a twisted, sour old man. I was indelibly tainted by the Dark Lord. I was damaged goods. I would not allow myself for even a moment to think that anyone would want me. I had seen lesser men destroyed by such foolish hopes. I would not be one of them. I would excise this imprudent passion from my heart. I would watch her graduate next week and I would go on with my life. It would not be difficult. I was used to being denied what I most wanted.

I pushed off from the wall and stubbed out my cigarette on the parapet. It was too late to go to bed now, so I straightened my robes and went down to breakfast.

The NEWT level class was the last of the afternoon and I spent the entire day dreading it and despising myself for doing so. I sat at my desk in front of the cold classroom as the students filed in. Malfoy was there, pale and silent now that his father was dead and the family fortunes gone. Parvati Patil came after him, and Dean Thomas, who had single-handedly killed Malcolm McNair after he found out that it was McNair who had murdered his father for refusing to join the Deatheaters. And finally, _she_ came through the door and slid into the seat in the last row. I watched her fidget with the opening of her satchel before taking her Potions text out and setting it carefully on the desk. Next came parchment and ink, then the two scrolls that made up her homework. She lined them up neatly on the desk before looking up expectantly and catching my eye.

It was the first time she had truly looked at me in six months and I saw her eyes widen as she took me in. I looked away from her uncomfortably, catching sight of my reflection in the glass of the window. My face was drawn and grey from lack of sleep. My usually immaculate robes were rumpled from being up all night and I knew my eyes were bloodshot. I ran a hand through his greasy hair and forced his spine to its usually rigid posture.

"Do not think that because this is your last class with me that I will allow you to waste time in sentimental reminiscence." My lip curled as I remembered how Minerva liked to spend her last class with the seventh years. "Nor will I squander one last chance to shape your purile minds into something resembling usefulness. Now, take out your books and turn to page eight-hundred sixty-three."

I dimmed the lights and shuttered the windows, having them work on the Luminous Noir potion. I walked through the aisles between the desks, criticizing the Gryffindors and giving praise to my Slytherins. I glided closer to _her_ desk, noting that her long hair was sliding off her shoulder towards her cauldron. I spoke from behind her.

"If you cannot keep you hair out of your potion Miss Granger, I suggest you cut it off."

"That would be an improvement." I heard Malfoy snigger behind me. Granger's face reddened but she merely took an elastic from her pocket and twisted her hair into a thick coil behind her head.

"Better?" she asked coolly, still not looking at me. I frowned at her. I could dock points for her not calling me "sir" but that would only fuel her anger. Instead I said, "It is adequate."

I walked away, silencing Draco with a "That will do, Mister Malfoy."

The students finished their potions and brought a beaker to the front for me to test. She was the last and had lingered so long that all the other students had scooped up their books and left the room. She stood in front of my desk, clutching a beaker of glowing pink potion to her chest.

"Sir. I just-"

"Leave the sample on my desk and go, Miss Granger." I interrupted.

She set the glass vial down on my desk and took a step back.

"I just wanted to say-"

"Miss Granger, please. There is nothing to discuss."

"Yes there is!" She threw up her hands. "You kissed me."

"Yes." I said heavily. "And I should not have done so. It was wrong. Now, there is nothing more to say. Please leave." I turned away and would have walked through the door into my office but her hand on my arm stopped me.

"But there _is_ more to say." Hermione insisted.

"Miss Granger, I do not understand this urgent need to discuss a foolish action that happened six months ago. You have, by neither word, nor look, nor deed, shown any inclination to do so before. I beg you, please, to desist doing so now!" I shook her hand from my arm and crossed into my office, slamming the door behind me. I did not go to the Leaving Feast that night or to the Graduation ceremony the next week.

_Well rid of her_. I thought for the hundredth time and made my way again to the Astronomy tower to watch the sun come up.


	3. Nor Deed

Chapter Three: Nor Deed

I did not see her again for three months. Not that I could escape hearing about her. Just three weeks after term ended Minerva burst into my office practically crowing.

"I got her, Severus! Oh, the competition was fierce and Flitwick almost beat me. Told her he could accelerate the fieldwork, have her done in two years instead of three. But I promised her access to my personal library and all the practical work she could take on-"

"Whatever are you on about?" I interrupted her.

"Hermione Granger of course. She has consented to become my apprentice."

September did not seem far enough away.

I divided my time that summer between my potions research and helping to break some of the more pernicious curses that surrounded the Riddle House. I had little liking for the task and would not have done it except, as Kingsley Shacklebolt correctly pointed out-"You are the only Deatheater who isn't dead or gibbering away in Azkaban."- so I was eminently qualified. Twice a week I Flooed to London and then Apparated with a team of Aurors to a safe spot outside Little Hangleton. I went in first, the protective wards shimmering faintly as I brushed past them like cobwebs, the Dark Mark on my arm tingling with sympathetic magic. Once inside I could guide the Aurors around, springing the traps and countering the curses laid by the Dark Lord here in the last few weeks of the war.

Each day left me strained and almost exhausted enough for sleep. Almost…because, in the moments between waking and sleeping, I no longer saw visions of my friends and colleagues dying. I saw Hermione Granger.

I saw her on the bloody Quidditch pitch fighting off Lucius Malfoy, her brown hair flying and her voice weaving a staccato rhythm of curse and counter-curse.

"_Stupefy_!" Lucius shouted at her. She deflected the curse and sent a "_Reducto_" that knocked him back.

A scream rent the air. Ron Weasley had just found his brother among the dead. For a moment, just a moment, Hermione's attention wavered and Lucius raised his wand in triumph.

"Crucio!"

I watched her fall as though in slow motion. Her body arched in an impossible bow, her head snapping back as she shrieked.

"Not so high and mighty are we now Mudblood?" Lucius' snarling patrician voice cut through the sounds of her screams. He flicked his wand negligently and released the curse. She laid on her side as he stood over her. I could see her try to raise her wand arm but it was trembling so violently that she could barely hold on to her wand.

"_Avada_-"

"_Expelliarmus_!" My curse hit him square in the chest. The look on Lucius' face was almost comical as his wand flew towards me. I caught it and with an audible –snap- broke it in half. Malfoy's face drained of color, his grey eyes furious as he launched himself at me. He never reached me. My curse him in midair and flayed the skin from his flesh. He fell to earth a writhing mass of muscle and sinew. It took him a long time to die. Granger was fighting her way over to me, struggling to walk and I scooped her up and ran for the castle….

Granger was standing at the door to my classroom and I caught the tail end of Malfoy's taunt.

"-Professor Snape doesn't want a Mudblood like you messing up his classroom."

Granger noticed me standing there and her brown eyes were filled with hurt as she turned them to me. I knew she expected me to reprimand Malfoy. I let my face reveal nothing and I saw the moment when my lack of response sunk in. Her chin lifted, even as her eyes filled with tears. She turned on her heel and walked away. It was the only day she ever missed my class…

Hermione was moving towards me, her arm outstretched. She laid her hand over my heart.

"Thank you Professor," she breathed and tilted her face to mine…

I woke hard and aching.

_Bloody hell._

I shrugged on my robes and made my way to the Astronomy tower. I stood with my back to the sunrise, closing my eyes and feeling the skin on my back prickle through my robes as the sun touched it. I shook a cigarette from the pack and lit it from the tip of my wand.

I could not go on like this. It was barely a week until term started and I was more befuddled then Longbottom. It would not do. I was bound to see her. Apprentices ate with the teachers. They had free rein of the staff room for Christ's sake! I could not avoid seeing her and I refused to act like a disgusting lovesick swain. It was ridiculous. I was ridiculous! I thought about the sheer stupidity of my desire for know-it-all Granger and let out a low bark of laughter that sounded suspiciously like a sob.

_Fuck._

I stubbed out the cigarette and stormed down to my office. I busied myself with pulling down ingredients from the high shelves, slamming cupboard doors and setting down my size seven cauldron with more force then was strictly necessary. For the next three hours I immersed myself in making the Wolfsbane potion and not thinking about Hermione Granger.

And just as I was sure that I was succeeding there was a knock on the door.

"Come in." I growled, not looking up from the potion in front of me. Stir counter-clockwise thirty-nine times. I turned the heat down to let the mixture simmer and looked up.

It was her. Of course.

"Miss Granger." I said, letting my voice rest on her name with the utmost contempt.

"Professor Snape." She was standing in front of the table I was working on and she spoke quickly. "I-I had something I wanted to say to you sir."

"Miss Granger-" I started but she interrupted me.

"Please sir. Just hear me out." I sighed and gestured for her to continue but for a long moment she did not. Then she began with the rushed delivery of someone who has practiced beforehand what they are going to say. I noticed her hands fidgeting with the edge of her robe, pinching it into little pleats as she spoke and her eyes did not meet mine.

"You said, the last time we spoke, that I had by neither word, nor look, nor deed ever shown any inclination to talk to you about what happened that night. But-"

She paused. I stood rooted to the spot, horrible anticipation filling me.

"The truth is, I've thought of little else since. I-I wanted you to know that it wasn't something that I did on impulse. I kissed you because I wanted to. I've wanted to for years."

She finally looked up at me and she looked- embarrassed? Hopeful? I could not tell. I stared at her in astonishment.

"Miss Granger-"

"I think you can safely call me Hermione now." She said with a small smile, walking around the table until she was standing in front of me. I stepped away from her and shook my head.

"Miss Granger, I am not a nice man. I am sarcastic and unforgiving. I do not suffer fools gladly. I-"

"Yes, I know." She interrupted me. She took a step forward and I moved to keep the distance between us, only to find my back pressed against the worktable behind me. "And your nose is rather long and your hair is too greasy. You keep odd hours and you enjoy swooping around the castle, frightening the first years." She took another step forward, and another, until she was only inches from me.

"And you muck about with smelly potions." She continued. "And you always wear black." She reached out and took my hands in hers. "I know, Severus. I know."

I opened my mouth to retort but her lips met mine and silenced all argument.

And as she kissed me breathless I realized that she knew me quite well after all.

FIN

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A/N: The phrase, for those who have asked, is "By neither word, nor look, nor deed…".

Many thanks to Miari, my lovely beta. As always, please R/R.


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